How to Lose a Client

Source: RainToday

Author Andrew Sobel recently helped a firm find out why it lost a contract opportunity for a major engagement. Here are excerpts from the letter he received from the prospect's CFO. (The names are fictional.)

1. Your friends did not get off to a great start. They spent a lot of time telling me about their leading market position and their “unique” methodologies. It would have been much better to ask good questions, to really listen to what I had to say, and to understand my organization.
2. Change Associates does have some history with my company and in the past had apparently done some good work. Roger, their lead partner, turned this advantage into a disadvantage by giving the impression the business was naturally going to be theirs.
3. The winner, Advanced Technologies, treated us like we were already a client and made a huge investment in understanding our business.
4. Advanced Technologies added value at every step of the process. They didn't “promise” to share insights – they did it, in every meeting.
5. Roger did a good job in the presentations. But he dominated it. We didn't get a good sense of their team. Advanced Technologies, on the other hand, had several relatively junior staff take important roles in the presentation.
6. All four competitors were pretty close on price – that was not the deciding factor. But Change Associates put forth a somewhat desultory proposal effort and wanted 15 percent more.
7. There were huge differences in the orals. Roger went through their slide deck, section by section. Advanced Technologies took a very different approach. They asked us which part of their proposal we wanted to spend time on and created more of a discussion with us about our business.
8. Finally, Change Management's relationship with our chairman hurt their cause because of the way they name-dropped. Advanced Technologies had long-standing relationships with several of our vice presidents and used these relationships to learn more about our business and the internal politics, but they didn't abuse them or put pressure on anyone.

For the complete article, read “Letter from a Client: This Is Why You Lost the Contract.”

From RainToday, www.raintoday.com, October 19, 2011.